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f a l l 2 0 1 5 | w e s t w o r l d 25 Call of the Wild "Lions," says our guide, gesturing to a riverbank below a ridge. "Looks like they've killed a buffalo." I'm an hour into a safari in Kruger National Park. We encounter a pride of lions gnawing on dinner – a mighty Cape buffalo – and pass around binoculars to make out the big golden cats half concealed in the grass. This is just the beginning. At nearly two million hectares, Kruger is packed with species. Lion Sands, one of the park's private concessions, sets the scene with large riverfront cottages separated by a raised boardwalk and its open-air Tinga Lodge. We slip into a routine of morning and evening drives to spot game, afternoons to relax. Over two and a half days we bump down red-sand paths in an open Land Rover, and the checklist grows: elephant, baboon, giraffe, leopard, hippo, hyena, nyala. Some hours we see only the graceful impala; other times we round a corner and spot a white rhino, one of the most endangered animals on earth. At night we gather at big tables lit by lanterns or candles and swap stories of our sightings over bowls of truffle-accented cauliflower soup or crocodile curry. Then it's early to bed – 5 a.m. is the wake-up call for the morning drive. It's a call no one misses. –K.S. But the true destination is still ahead: the cliffs of Cape Point. Driving into the nature reserve, the coastal vegetation (or fynbos, as it's called), reminds me of the scrubby northern landscape with its rocks, clumps of white-flowering helichrysum and shrubby protea bushes (the nature reserve is one of the richest floral kingdoms in the world, with more than 1,100 types of indige- nous plants). A funicular runs the short rise to a light- house at the top, where there are wide paths with many points to stop and just take it in. It's hard to disagree with Sir Francis Drake, who in 1580 called it the fairest cape in all the world. I lean against a lookout and watch the waves crash more than 200 metres below along the isolated Dias Beach. It's stunning to be so close to the southern tip of the continent. The beautiful vistas aren't just on the coast. Within an hour's drive inland from Cape Town, hundreds of estates line the val- leys and hillsides. But my first stop is in the Constantia Valley, only 20 minutes from downtown Cape Town. Muscadel grapes were planted here in 1685 by the Cape Colony's first governor. "e Germans come here and cry because they wish they could make Riesling like this," says Lisa Griggs, a wine specialist and guide at Klein Constantia. She is pouring the vineyard's 2012 vintage, known for its crisp flavour and citrus-blossom nose, and it becomes the first bottle to be tucked into my suitcase. e estate is famous for its sweet Vin de Constance, praised by Jane Austen for its "healing powers on a disappointed heart." Once lost due to vine blight, two years of The dramatic landscape at Cape Point. CAA Travel consultant Susan Wingert experienced her trip of a lifetime to South Africa. See page 44.